The top fivecountrieswith the largestshare of women ministers are in Europe and the Americas, withCanada and Sandinista-run Nicaragua leading the way

The number of women in executive roles in government and parliament globally has stagnated with only minor improvements since 2015, according to a new report by U.N. Women, with the Americas witnessing the most gains compared to other regions.

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Zimbabwe currently has the highest teenage fertility rate in the sub-Saharan Africa, according to a national study.

The research, quoted at a television report, showed that one in 10 girls, aged 15 to 19 years, become pregnant every year, which in some measure this event has been associated to cultural and religious practices.

The African nation has recorded from 500,000 to 700,000 pregnancies annually, and a fifth of them in this age group are a consequence of child marriage, said the report, which also expressed concern about statistics on maternal mortality (about 514 women died in 2016 giving birth, according to official statistics).

Zimbabwean representative at the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), Cheikh Cisse, warned that the problem ‘requires our urgent attention’, as pregnancy in adolescence potentially reduces opportunities for girls and young women.

A teenager could provide a contribution to her country ‘if she did not get married during her childhood, if she is not forced to drop out school or exposed to an unplanned pregnancy that puts her at high risk for illness,’ Cisse said.

About 20,000 young people under 18 years old are giving birth each day, in developing countries, a figure equivalent to 7.3 million births per year, UNFPA says.

There are 101 adolescent births per 1,000 women in southern Africa, an issue that ‘remains a major challenge worldwide,’ Cisse stressed.

Adolescent pregnancy has been one of the main factors contributing to maternal and infant mortality and to the vicious circle of poor health and poverty, the official said.

In Alexandria, Virginia, just outside Washington, D.C., Superintendent of Schools Alvin Crawley said classes for the entire district, which serves more than 15,000 students, would be canceled Wednesday after 300 teachers and other staff members asked to have the day off.

“The decision is based solely on our ability to provide sufficient staff to cover all our classrooms, and the impact of high staff absenteeism on student safety and delivery of instruction,” Crawley said in an announcement.

The one-day protest, which is being held in conjunction with International Women’s Day, is intended to draw attention to the plight of women in the workplace who on average are paid 20 cents less than men.

The protest is already affecting dozens of schools, which are heavily staffed by women. The strike organizers include some of the organizers of the Jan. 21 Women’s March on Washington that brought out millions of women across the country and the world.

Also canceling classes for Wednesday is the Chapel Hill-Carrboro City school district in North Carolina, where officials anticipated that 400 to 2,000 staff members would not show up for work. The district, which encompasses 21 schools, said absences on a typical day number around 100 staff or 5 percent of its workforce.